Shocks of All Sorts
by fringeperson
Summary: ONESHOT. COMPLETE. DO NOT OWN. this has nothing to do with licorice all sorts. A few familiar faces fall through a storm, and find that things where they have landed are... not exactly how they remember.


There had been an accident, a storm. Youko had been at the docks with her entourage, talking to the fishermen of one of the port villages of Kei. She, Shoukei, Suzu and Rakushun had been caught up in the storm and transported to Japan. She knew it the instant she had opened her eyes. Her companions on the other hand, had been bewildered, even Suzu, as she had 'disappeared' approximately a century before.

"Well, this is going to be troublesome," she said to herself as she stood up and went to check on her friends. "I hope Kei is alright."

"Youko... is this?" Suzu asked as she looked around.

She nodded. "It has changed a lot since you were last here I think," Youko answered, helping the girl to her feet.

"Your face has changed," Suzu said.

"Well, I'm a taika, not just a kaikyaku," she answered, raising a hand to her face. "I'm still me though."

Shoukei didn't seem to know what to think, and Rakushun... well... Youko smiled and pulled off one of the large, heavy robes of state that she was still wearing and draped it around his naked form. It wouldn't do for him to be wandering around without any clothes on, at least not at this time of year; judging from the temperature, the naked man festival wasn't likely to be due for some months yet.

"I don't understand..." he said quietly, "I'm stuck like this..."

"Then by the time Enki or Keiki finds us, you will be a master of yourself completely," Youko said softly, trying to be reassuring, before helping him to his feet.

"Y-_Youko_?" a voice, female and shocked, asked.

The red-haired girl turned around sharply.

"Yuka!"

"It really is you..." the brown-haired girl said, eyes wide. "What are you doing here?"

"Not sure, oh... Shoukei, Suzu, Rakushun, this is my friend Yuka," she said to the others, gesturing between them and speaking in a mixture of Japanese and the language of the twelve kingdoms.

"And this," Yuka added, stroking her slightly round stomach, "is due in five months."

Youko almost jumped her friend, and Suzu smiled broadly. "Congratulations," they both chorused excitedly.

"Boy?" Suzu asked.

"Girl?" Youko questioned at the same time.

"Surprise," Yuka answered firmly.

Shoukei and Rakushun just watched in confusion. The conversation was hard for them to follow, despite that they understood Japanese.

Youko turned to them with a smile. "In Japan, children are carried in the stomach, rather than grown as fruit on trees. Yuka is expecting a child in five months."

The two nodded their understanding. They had heard of this, but it was the first time that they were seeing it.

"You want to stay at my place?" Yuka asked suddenly. "I've got a two-year-old boy and my husband is out of town on business. I'll probably be in labour by the time he gets back again, and I'd really like the company."

"You don't mind?" Youko asked.

"Youko, I am this close to insisting," Yuka answered, holding her forefinger and thumb a half-inch apart from each other. "Besides, you can all help me get the shopping home, I was just on my way to do it and collect little Arai from play group."

Youko smiled. "We would all be honoured," she said gratefully.

~oOo~

Suzu, Rakushun and Shoukei were all fascinated with Japan. Suzu because of all the advances since her time, and the other two because it was a completely alien world. Suzu talked with Yuka about everything, and Youko explained a lot of stuff to Rakushun and Shoukei as they went through the shops.

When they had emerged from the grocery shop and it started to rain, Rakushun and Shoukei were visibly startled. Suzu, on the other hand, ran straight out into it and twirled around.

"I never knew I'd miss rain so much," she said when she could finally be convinced to return to the shelter of the shop awning.

"I'll get some umbrellas," Yuka said with a chuckle, handing her bag of groceries over to Youko and ducking back inside.

Properly equipped for the weather, the group followed Yuka through the streets until they reached a brightly painted building and she headed inside, re-emerging a moment later with the hand of a little boy gripped firmly in her own. He promptly hid behind her leg when he saw the strangers.

"Arai, this is my friend Youko, and some of her friends. They're going to stay with us for a while, and help mummy around the house, and maybe they'll even play with you a bit. Okay?" Yuka said to the child, smiling at him and pulling him out to greet them all.

Everybody greeted the child with a smile and soon they were all on their way again.

"You don't have a car?" Youko asked.

"The doctor says not to drive after three months," Yuka answered, "and I'm four already. We have a car, but apparently I'm in no condition to use it."

When they reached Yuka's house, rooms were quickly arranged, and the pregnant woman was slightly surprised that Youko and Rakushun would be sharing a room.

"What happened to that big mouse you were so fond of?" Yuka asked.

Rakushun blushed, and Youko laughed, explaining the situation in full to her friend, which got her laughing as well.

It was only a week before things started to become routine. Youko had gone to find her parents, only to find her father already dead and her mother's health failing – to the point where she'd had a heart attack when she saw her long-lost daughter. She'd called an ambulance, but when they arrived, the paramedics had to give her the bad news that she had, unintentionally, caused her mother's heart to stop.

At least now she had some money. As the only child of only children everything fell to her now. She had quickly bought clothes for her friends and a great pile of books for Rakushun. If he couldn't learn something, then she knew he would have felt his time here not put to good use.

Apart from those few things, Youko sold the house and everything in it, then proceeded to buy all the groceries while they lived with Yuka and her son.

It wasn't until they had been there for two weeks that Youko started to become sick, throwing up in the mornings.

Shoukei and Rakushun had instantly worried that Kei had gone to ruin in Youko's absence and Keiki had died, triggering her own illness, which would in turn lead to her death.

Suzu and Yuka, though also concerned, had simply insisted that she go to a doctor.

"Well, I have good news, your friend isn't dying," the doctor informed the group as they sat in the waiting room, a wry smile on his face. He had heard the concerns of the strange two, and the more reasonable ones of the other two women, and upon checking out the red-haired young lady, had been surprised himself.

When they got back to Yuka's house, Youko told them exactly what the doctor had found to be the cause of her illness.

"I'm pregnant."

Suzu and Yuka had squealed in delight, hugging her enthusiastically. Shoukei and Rakushun had stared in shock.

"Apparently the baby looks to be two months along though," she continued to explain when they released her, then looked at Rakushun. "Are you alright?" she asked him.

"You have a child growing inside of you," he said quietly, "and you're asking if _I_ am alright?"

"Well, it's the normal way of things here," she pointed out. "I'm surprised, but not scared or anything... but Rakushun..."

"I think she's trying to tell you that you're the father," Suzu chuckled. "It requires a male to make a female pregnant after all, and you're the only one she's been with."

All colour drained from Rakushun's face, and the women all watched as his yellow eyes rolled back into his head and he passed out.

~oOo~

"You seem to be developing at the rate of a month per week Youko," the doctor told her solemnly when she returned for her next appointment two weeks later. "I can't figure it out."

Youko swallowed. Now she was nervous. "Is the child healthy apart from that?" she asked.

The doctor nodded. "Apart from that, yes, you're fine. I will see you again in another two weeks."

Youko nodded and, with a reassuring handshake from the medical man, left his practice.

"It's going unnaturally fast, but otherwise I'm fine," she assured Yuka, who had come with her. They hugged quickly and Yuka went in for her own appointment with the doctor.

~oOo~

At the end of her ninth week, Youko lay panting on Yuka's bathroom floor, Suzu, Shoukei and Yuka herself all hovering hover her, and Rakushun pacing nervously in the living room. Screams occasionally drifted out to him, but he could not bring himself to go in and see Youko, the woman he loved, in such pain as she – and the books she had bought for him – had explained that it would be.

"Excuse me, but is Yuka home?" a young man, about Rakushun's apparent age, asked sticking his head in the door. Black eyes and hair, blacker than even most people of Japan, Rakushun thought.

"Yes," he answered, "but she's helping my wife deliver our child right now." It was strange how good it felt for him to say that, but he realised that he felt truly warm doing so.

"Yes, I thought I smelled... Oh dear..." the young man suddenly passed out.

Rakushun hurried to make him comfortable on the couch.

When Yuka emerged from the bathroom two hours later, the stranger was still out cold.

"Eh? When did Takasato get here?" she asked when she saw him, though she kept walking to the linen closet.

"Him? Two hours ago, passed out almost as soon as he came through the door," Rakushun chuckled nervously. "And I thought I was bad. How is she?"

Yuka smiled. "Youko is just fine, and so is your son. I came out for towels to clean up, but I think maybe you should come in and help her up and to her bed."

Rakushun nodded appreciatively. He wanted to see the child that _he_ had made with his Youko.

~oOo~

"Rakushun, what will you call your son?" Youko asked once she had been settled into their temporary bed and was resting against him with their child in her arms.

"Perhaps Sato?" he suggested. "While you were..."

"In labour?"

Rakushun nodded. "A young man came, he passed out shortly after coming through the door, but Yuka called him Takasato, so I thought perhaps..."

Youko nodded. "I think that Sato is a fine name."

"Ah, found you at last!"

Two heads whipped around to see Enki sitting in the window, dangling his feet.

"Really, Keiki should be the one who came looking for you, but that would be like abandoning Kei, and you would disapprove of that," the young-looking Kirin said, hopping down to the floor.

"I would," Youko agreed. "Enki, would you like to see the child I just gave birth to?"

That peaked the kirin's curiosity, and indeed he approached to view the child.

"Are you all here?" he asked, raising his nose to sniff the air, only to become dizzy.

"Yes, and careful, the mess isn't all cleaned up yet," Youko cautioned.

"Perhaps if you wait in the lounge room, then we can all go," Rakushun suggested.

Enki nodded and headed through the door and down the hall.

"You _found_ him!" the boy yelled, startling everybody.

Youko quickly checked on her child before allowing Rakushun to help her up and they all went to see what had Enki so excited.

"Kei-ou, this is Taiki, he's been missing for so long! I've been looking for him since before you were empress!" the kirin explained happily.

"I knew he was different," Yuka said with a sigh as she looked at him. "I suppose you will be taking him back with you as well? I'll miss his visits."

~oOo~

Keiki was relieved when Enki returned with Youko, Rakushun, and Shoukei, particularly Youko, but he hadn't expected him to have left Suzu behind, or to have found Taiki or picked up an infant.

"Suzu wanted to stay behind," Youko explained. "Japan was her home, and though it has changed, she wants to be there, and Yuka is glad for her to stay."

"But who is the child?"

"My son."

The kirin nearly fell over.

"Careful Keiki," Taiki said, smiling slightly. He was glad to be back, and as he was older now, he had a better idea of how things needed to work. "Wouldn't want you to loose your dignity."

~The End~


End file.
